What is Sports Vision?

Sports Vision Training isn’t about correcting your vision. You wear glasses or contacts for that. Vision Therapy is about training (or retraining) the brain to achieve maximum efficiency in the way it processes and responds to visual inputs. Sports Visionis about training people with excellent vision to process and respond to what they see faster and better. Using a personalized and customized series of techniques and exercises, the brain learns to respond more accurately and efficiently. It’s just like muscle memory. Once you know and refine exactly how to react, you can do it again and again, and get better every time.

An athlete on the top of his or her game needs neuro-visual responses that are dynamic, precise, and fully aligned every time, all of the time. Visit The Sports Vision Center at Neuro-Vision Associates of North Texas for a comprehensive assessment.

Visual Processing Is How Sport Is Played

Vision is way more than how well you read off a chart. Having 20/20 vision doesn’t count for much if you can’t properly track a ball with your eyes, or anticipate where your opponent is headed. If you can’t intercept the play and turn it around, how are you going to succeed?

Sport is all about the visual. The eye sees, the brain interprets and leads, and the body follows. Coaches, athletes, and pundits alike need to keep in mind that the visual processing our brain does is prone to fumbles. Incorrect or poorly timed responses are what hold back good athletes from becoming great. Even with the best coaching and tactics, sports performance can suffer if not properly honed. Bad habits need to be reversed, while positive skills need to be nurtured. This is what sports vision is all about.

The visual system summarizes what is seen, then tells the brain to activate the muscles to execute a motor action. Vision directs the intelligent movement of the body (the eyes lead the body). The more accurate the visual system can take in and process visual information, the more accurate it can direct appropriate motor movement.

What Happens When Our Visual System Is Inaccurate?

Ball not always seen clearly

Over or under-estimating the distance of the ball

Difficulty making the “shot,” “pass” or “play”

Performance in competition deteriorates late in the game or under stress

Prone to repeating similar mistakes again and again

Inconsistent performance

Fatigue

You CAN optimize, correct, and enhance your visual skills through training! Be the athlete you know you can be. Let Dr. Charles Shidlofsky and Dr. Kristen Hatton help.

Sports Vision Training Enhances The Following Skills:

The vision/brain skills listed below provide significant benefit in every sport. For the purposes of providing a real-life example, we will use baseball below.

faster, more accurate hand-eye coordination– Be more accurate at batting, throwing, and pitching, by improving the eye’s ability to direct body movement.

vision-balance integration– Balance relies on vision, and most aspects of sports performance can be improved with better balance.

visual reaction time– As the 90 mph baseball comes flying at you, every improvement in the time it takes to react to visual stimuli is essential.

visualization

dynamic visual acuity– see the ball while in motion, clearly.

depth perception and distance estimation– Assess more accurately and quickly the speed and distance of a moving object.

focusing– rapidly change focus from near and far, such as a quick transition from getting the ball from the glove (close work) to throwing it to first base (far).

Contrast Sensitivity– Improved contrast improves the ability to see the ball against a white sky.

Sports Vision Training For Baseball

Baseball requires better than 20/20 vision. In fact, the vast majority of MLB baseball players have better than 20/15 vision. Odds are that if you can’t see at least as well as 20/15 then you aren’t going to make it into professional baseball.

And it’s more than visual acuity which makes a great baseball player. You have to be able to see where the ball is in any background and accurately gauge where and when to swing, pitch, and throw. This requires exceptional depth perception and contrast sensitivity, amongst other visual skills.

At The Sports Vision Center at Neuro-Vision Associates of North Texas in Plano, Texas, we work with aspiring and professional baseball athletes to hone and enhance their athletic visual skills through advanced Sports Vision Training techniques.

Sports Vision Training For Basketball

A basketball player depends on a number of visual processes in order to be at the top of his or her game. Judging the ball in motion and the distance, direction, and speed of players all depends on balance, proper eye tracking, and hand-eye coordination.

These vision skills can be improved and enhanced through sports vision training—turning a good player into a great one.

Sports Vision Training For Football

The core athletic skills in football players come down to how rapidly and accurately they visually interpret and react in real-time. These skills can be refined, improved, and enhanced through sports vision training. The vision skills that are pivotal for a football player’s success include:

Hand-eye coordination

Peripheral vision

Reaction time

Visual memory

Depth-perception

For an assessment of more information, please give The Sports Vision Center at Neuro-Vision Associates of North Texas a call.

The Research On Sports Vision Enhancement

Improved Batting Averages

A study of the University of Cincinnati baseball team showed drastic improvement in the batting averages of players following six weeks of various kinds of vision training. The team batting average went up 34 points from the previous season, exceeding improvements of other N.C.A.A. teams. Errors decreased by 15 %, while fielding assists increased by 8 %. Across all tracked batting parameters, vision training showed improvements of 10% or more.

Another study conducted out of the University of California Riverside tested the effects of Vision Training on real-life applications with their own college baseball team. The athletes on their baseball team were able to improve their reading of eye charts by 30 percent — as well as their batting averages — after completing more than two dozen 25-minute vision training sessions using a computer program. According to the study, “trained players showed improved vision after training, had decreased strike-outs, and created more runs”.

Contact Dr. Charles Shidlofsky and Dr. Kristen Hatton to stay at the top of your game.

Vision Training Works For All Sports

Numerous studies have tracked the benefit of Vision Training for athletes from many different sports. Some of the sports that have shown improvement in performance are hockey, table tennis, golf, rugby, soccer, and tennis. For sports with rapid movements, the athletes who have undergone sports vision training have a significant advantage over their competition.

Call our office today.

At The Sports Vision Center at Neuro-Vision Associates of North Texas, we work with athletes in just about every sport to sharpen their game skills. These include:

Hockey is one of the fastest sports in the world and therefore requires excellent visual skills. Successful hockey players start vision training at a young age and constantly sharpen their visual skills to meet the challenges of this intense game.

Athletic success can boost a teenager’s self-confidence. Your role as a parent or coach is to provide them with the support they need to achieve the best possible results. Learn why you should consider sports vision training if your child is underachieving. It can be a game-changer.

Coaches know that perfect timing and positioning are the cornerstones to mastering the game of tennis. Sports vision training can help your players significantly improve their timing and positioning. Find out why vision plays a crucial role, and how to train visual skills.

Sports vision training is essential for excelling in your sport. In order to prescribe a vision training program and assess your progress, your eye doctor will need to evaluate your vision skills. Below, we'll delve into the various tests you should expect to undergo.